When do you put the subject before the verb?

So I'm going through the reverse tree, and anytime I put the lo to indicate the subject before the verb I get the answer wrong. Then, when I don't put it in I get it wrong for not having it there. There must be a rule I'm not understanding to explain this. Can anyone shed some light on this for me?

0

3 years ago

9 Comments

I think I'm starting to see that. So in cases where it's "I blank it", you can put the lo before the verb. Otherwise the only time you put a le, te, me, nos, or les is when they are the indirect object and you are indicating who is receiving the action.

Along the same lines, I just got dinged for She found juice, which I translated as Ella encontró el jugo. It said I shouldn't have used an el, but I swear other times in the English sentence there wasn't an el and I got dinged for not putting one in. Is there a rule for when these are or not required.

I'm looking at one of my grammar books, under the section of Le/Les and Lo/La/Los/Las, more specifically on their use as indirect object pronouns:
1.) receiving or acquiring any thing, impression, or sensation.
2.) loss or removal from
3.) sufficiency, insuficieny, lack, excess
4.) requesting, requiring, ordering
5.) 'tener + an emotion', for example 'le tiene miedo'
6.) 'hacer + a noun', for example 'les hacía caso'
7.) to indicate persons or things affected by something done to a part of their body or to a beloved posession , for example, 'los fríos le hielan los dedos'
8.) to convey ideas of giving, removing, benefiting, involving, or affecting intimately.
As far as DuoLingo goes, you'll have to pay attention to the questions and their context and try to get a feel for how they're using it and when they want it.

Verb-Subject is commonly used to avoid separating a subject from it's verb. They like to keep the pronouns close to the verb it relates to and tend not to separate them.
Three common sentence constructions are: Subject-Verb-Direct Object: Inés leyó el libro, Direct Object-(redundant pronoun)-Verb-Subject: El libro lo leyó Inés, Direct Object-Subject-(redundant pronoun)-Verb: El libro Inés lo leyó. There are a few other possible constructions, but they are not common.

Yes. My source is 'A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish' each construction should is correct. The first is neutral and equally stresses Inés and book. The Second emphasizes the book as the topic of the sentence and describes what happened to it. The third would appear as a portion of a whole sentence but is correct in itself as a fragment.